


Hope

by sinnabonka



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Bobo left us despair, Coda, Dean Winchester Saves Castiel, Destiel is canon baby, I'm bringing back hope, Love Confessions, M/M, Positive endgame party, The closure we deserved, This is canon and 15x20 can suck my metaphorical dick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-11
Updated: 2020-11-11
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:08:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27512836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sinnabonka/pseuds/sinnabonka
Summary: “I’m gonna say something, Cas, and you better have your ears on.”Dean’s truth being spoken.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 72
Kudos: 637





	Hope

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't slept for more then 4 hours a day in the past week, so this happened.

There’s dark, there’s pitch dark, and then there’s _this_. For a moment Dean wonders if he went blind, when nothing changes as he opens his eyes. 

“Cas!”

There’s no reply, there’s no echo.

The emptiness devours everything upon its reach.

With the little time he’s got, he can’t waste any on overthinking, doubting. He didn’t parade all the way through the deepest of Hell and the highest of Heaven for nothing, he has a job to do. 

Dean takes another step, trusting his soles over his eyes, and slowly exhales. He calls out again, still not loud enough, and the blackness easily absorbs his voice.

“Cas, you here?” Dean asks quietly, desperately, his hands restless in examining the space around, finding nothing. “What kind of dumb question is that. I know you here, ‘course you are.”

Dean looks over his shoulder. The thin rip of the portal keeps blinking, weakening, slowly fading, like a tiny spark of hope in the hunter’s heart. He’s been wandering around for some time now, but who knows the real size of this place. How can he be sure he even popped in the right corner? 

He halts, as if hearing something, but that must be the noise of his own bloodstream, the thudding in his temple mirroring the beating of his racing heart.

“I’m gonna say something, Cas, and you better have your ears on.” Dean takes a steadying breath and puts all his strength for the voice to regain that little joyful jingle he has around the angel most of the time. “You didn’t give me a chance to say anything, when... well, the last time. And that’s not cool. Totally not cool. You don’t shove such things in man’s face and go down the black cosmic goo.”

He hears some rustling behind his back, but doesn’t turn around as he wouldn’t see a damn thing anyway. The Empty is not that empty after all, and being the bed of honor to the eldest children of creation, some must be having bad dreams. 

Dean keeps talking. The words are heavy and hot against his tongue. 

“Those things you said... those _beautiful_ things you said, Cas, how am I supposed to top that?” He chuckles softly. His eyes hurt from all the staring into the blackness, he feels tears pooling up. “For the longest time I knew those words were reserved for a different kind of people. Good people. _Not me_.” 

The first teardrop drips down his cheek, Dean doesn’t bother to catch it with the back of his hand. 

“The things I’ve done, Cas... People I’ve hurt… How can I deserve any of those beautiful words of yours?” 

He feels the sob rising in his chest and his throat closing up. Before it clenches completely, he pushes the last question out with a trembling voice: “How can I be worth your love?” 

The first sob sends a wave of shudders through his body, the second comes right after and punches the air out of his lungs. Dean feels sick, like he’s gonna either faint or throw up. Maybe both, if the deafening silence is all he gets in return. 

“You’ve changed me, too. You’ve changed me big time.” Dean catches a breath and closes his eyes. “You gave me faith, when there was literally nothing. You gave me something to hold onto, Cas. I couldn’t have gotten so far if it was not for you. The way you believed in me, when not a single soul in the whole world did... That’s what got me through, that’s what kept the light on.” 

Time is running out, and Dean can feel it with his skin. The portal won’t last long, he knew that, and being a one-time thing it only gives him one chance to do this right. Once closed, the portal could never be opened again, not from the outside anyway. 

“Cas!” Dean screams, voice breaking with despair. “Please, man, you gotta give me something.”

He’s been strong for so long. For Sam, for Jack, for the whole damn world. But everything has a breaking point, even Dean Winchester.

He finally gives in to the feeling and it washes over him, like the cold waters of the endless ocean washing over the sandy shore. He falls to his knees, crumbling, like an ancient building, no subject to reconstruction, and buries his face in his hand. He cries. All those tears he suppressed back in the bunker, later while fighting Chuck, while looking for the right spell and the right place, are now finding their way out. He cries ugly, face wet and red, probably, but fortunately wrapped in darkness. 

He presses a hand to his chest, right where his heart is the loudest, and pulls all his faith in a little prayer: “Please, Castiel, answer me. I hope you can hear me, man. Wake up. Say something. Anything.”

He wouldn’t care if there was a witness to his misery, to his begging, anyone is welcomed to watch. He’s way past giving a fuck about such things. The whole world can point its finger at him and laugh, and he wouldn’t give the tiniest rat’s ass about it. There are some things important in this life, and some that are not. 

Someone said to Dean once, that later is always too late, and now the thought hits him like a truck. Maybe it took him too long to get here, maybe the angel is sound asleep, maybe he can’t wake up. Or he won’t. Maybe he didn’t think Dean would come back for him, why would he? He didn’t squeeze a single word out of himself, except for the broken, desperate, aching “Please, don’t do this”. 

_Please, don’t do this, don’t give me everything I’ve ever wanted in my life just for it to be yanked away from my hands right away._

Dean takes a deep breath, meant to steady him, to bring him back up his feet, but instead it pulls another wailing sound out of his throat. 

Dean feels his heart falling, lower and lower, down his stomach, and then the words, the heaviest of words just slip from his tongue: 

“ ‘course you can have me, Cas. You always have.”

He’s so selfish, coming here and demanding to be heard. Cas found his happiness in just being, just saying it aloud, but Dean is petty and the only thing worthwhile is having Cas back. The fight is over, the world is safe and sound, and for once Dean Winchester wants to be selfish, he wants good things to happen to him, too. He’s entitled, he’s due, after everything he’s lost and sacrificed, it’s time for a little miracle of his own. 

There’s weight on Dean’s shoulder, right atop the bloody handprint on his jacket, which he kept on despite Sam insisting on changing. He just couldn’t bring himself to get rid of the last thing he had of the angel. He needed a proof, a reminder, that all of it was real. If he was to die of Chuck’s hand, at least there was something of Castiel’s with him.

Dean leans into the touch, grateful to the mirage warmth against his skin. It feels like an echo of the half forgotten dream, a slightest déjà vu.

The hand moves to his face, fingertips trace his skin, marking his cheekbone with a featherlight touch. Dean follows, his eyes shut. The hand trembles hesitantly, before cupping his face, pulling it up. 

“Dean,” the soft low voice breaks the cocoon of silence.

Dean shakes his head. The touch on his cheek is not real, the voice in his head is phantom. He’s been through it over and over again, just to be woken up by the alarm going off. He’s losing his mind again. Sam said it wasn’t his brightest idea, and god knows how Dean hates when the jerk is right. Very few ideas in his head are bright now, but what else is new? 

Dean opens his eyes, it takes a moment for them to adjust. The darkness steps away, firstly he can make out only the outlines of the surroundings in the dim yellow light. 

The light is warm, welcomed. The green in Dean’s eyes gets brighter, when he brings himself to look up. 

His heart skips a beat, his mind buzzes like a beehive. He double-takes the image before his eyes. It can’t be real, and yet it is. 

“I heard you, Dean.” 

Castiel’s smile is soft, the hand caressing Dean’s face is gentle. 

It’s just a moment and Dean is back on his feet, and he is smiling, and there are different tears now streaming down his face. They are not bitter. 

He pulls Cas in for a hug. If it was not for the strong hands wrapped around him, Dean would float away like a frigging balloon. Except, he’s not empty anymore, there are feelings, words rushing through him. He’s done being numb and silent. 

“Don’t you dare leave me again, you son of a bitch.” He mutters in Cas’ shoulder. He’s pressing so hard to him, he can physically feel him breaking into a smile.

The walls Dean’s been rising inside his mind for the last few weeks are crushing, all and at once. He wants to voice every single thought ever coming to his head since, but it’s not the place, nor time for it.

Some things need time to sink in and a place to be stored. They’ll get there, but first he has to get them both to safety. 

He pulls away, just enough to see Cas’ face. The big bright eyes, those familiar patterns of wrinkles around, like cracks on the oil painting.

Dean wonders how on earth he could miss the affection shining in them for all those years, and quietly promises himself to never ever take it for granted. 

He strokes Cas’ jawline, the motion aiming for comfort, and says with a fond smile etched across his face: 

“Let’s take you home, a’right?” 

Cas nods, content, relaxed, and, keeping Dean’s hand around his shoulders, he starts walking toward the portal weakly glimmering in the middle of darkness.

There are some things left unsaid, scratching Dean’s palate with impatience. He’ll get there, eventually, but most importantly, they’ve got time now. And Dean’s got his second chance, which is one more than most people get, and two more than he ever dreamed of getting in this life. 

  
  



End file.
